Japan through English Windows^®

By DAVID APPLEYARD

Ever had that feeling nobody loves you? Well, if you're an English Windows user in Japan you'll know exactly what it's like to be out on a limb. To start with, your erstwhile best friend Microsoft doesn't want to know you. If you try to order their English software online direct from the States or the U.K., you'll be told that only Microsoft Japan has a license to sell Microsoft products to those resident here, no matter what their linguistic background. If, however, you take the trouble to visit their Japanese website you won't find one single word of advice in English for the benefit of non-Japanese. U.S. Microsoft must be well aware of this shortcoming and have evidently chosen to ignore it. 

Admittedly, certain mainstream English software can be especially ordered in Japan, but it's a bit of a gray area, something nobody talks about. Mention it away from larger cities such as Tokyo and Osaka and a sharp intake of breath can be heard emanating from the staff of your average computer store. Shrugging their shoulders almost in disbelief, they get on the phone to their local suppliers and a second layer of resistance has to be overcome. Inexperienced staff might try to discourage you from pursuing the matter but you mustn't give up. Usually it's head office in Tokyo that saves the day, and if you are willing to wait two or three weeks you'll receive a phone call from the store inviting you pick up that precious upgrade for original English Windows or perhaps the Office suite, but definitely not the Encarta encyclopedia, the English version of which is not sold in Japan. 

Even if you do manage to get hold of your English software, you won't be entitled to any technical support. For that you require a Japanese operating system and mastery of two to three thousand Chinese characters with multiple pronunciations. Quite a tall order considering Japanese is generally recognized as being one of the most complex means of communication on the planet. Even natives are unsure about how to write or pronounce names correctly. For foreigners, either unable or unmotivated to devote weeks and months, if not years to painstaking practice and memorization, using a Japanese computer can be a pretty daunting experience. One false move in a dialogue box and you can cause a fair bit of trouble or perhaps lose that all important document.

The layout of the Japanese keyboard is a further headache that renders it less than useful for writing in English. Because there are no gaps in between Japanese words, the all-important space bar has been made uncomfortably short in order to accommodate some additional keys required by Japanese users. It is interesting to note, however, that both Chinese and Korean keyboards maintain the long space bar. A further sore point is the placing of the apostrophe, which the average Japanese rarely needs to worry about and an educated English speaker needs all the time.

Even on the hardware front, life is far from easy for native English computer users in Japan. To start with, English OS computers are not stocked in regular stores and have to be specially ordered from mail order operations or specialist outlets in larger cities. It goes without saying that maintenance can also be a hassle with no on-site service available. To avoid inflated repair bills, the English OS user in Japan often develops into something of a computer nerd, with a shelf full of English manuals imported from the likes of Amazon.com. Peripherals have to be selected from those few items for which English-language operating software, drivers and help manuals can be obtained, usually from foreign manufacturers. Japanese domestic models are rarely sold overseas and so no English software is available for them. A positive development is that Hewlett Packard now include English OS drivers with all their printers and scanners sold in Japan — these used to have to be downloaded from the Internet. 

One consistently reliable supplier of English OS computers in Japan used to be Gateway of the U.S. Throughout the latter half of the 1990s their bilingual engineers provided excellent technical support in English toll-free over the telephone during regular office hours. Sadly, this giant among direct-sales manufacturers has now pulled out of Asia altogether, a victim of the worldwide slump in PC sales around the turn of the century.

Japan still has a long way to go before it becomes as internationally minded as, let's say, Singapore. The problems encountered by its English-language computer users are basically ones of attitude in a society not used to catering to minorities of any description. At the same time, the manufacturer of the world's leading operating system should be making much more of an effort to help its English-speaking customers outside the U.S. 

©David Appleyard 2001-2005   All rights reserved